The BBC cites data from the International Organization for Migration (IOM), which are probably the best available. According to IOM, in 2015 there were 6,000 traffickers in the Agadez region of Niger who transported some 340,000 migrants across the Sahara to Libya. The migrants were eventually bound for Europe. They came from all over West Africa to Agadez, long a center of the cross Sahara trade.

Oby Ezekwesili announced she is stepping down as the presidential candidate of the Allied Congress Party of Nigeria. The elections are scheduled for February 16. She said her goal now is to build a coalition that would provide an alternative to the All Nigeria Progressives Congress (APC), the party of incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari, and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), whose presidential candidate is former Vice President Atiku Abubakar.